Feel the Silence
by Periphery
Summary: A collection of post-eps for season ten. Zebras: The only words big enough for tonight are, "Thank you."
1. Swing

_Disclaimer: I don't own them._

_A/N: I get the feeling I'm going to be getting a lot of these out of my system ... so I'm going to put them all in one story. Title from a wonderful song by the Goo Goo Dolls. Oh, and I thought Olivia's last line was awesome...things had been so intense and then she said that and I laughed like she'd broken some kind of spell. Am I crazy?_

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At home he's still sleeping on the couch; the kids are giving him sad looks that clearly communicate _I'm not about to cross Mom._ By the time Elliot goes back to work, all he wants is for somebody over the age of one to look at him like nothing ever happened.

Apparently this is too much to ask.

Today he and Olivia have closed one of their easy cases – "easy" meaning that the victim will be in therapy for years but at least they arrested the perp within twelve hours. She's sitting across from him typing up her report and he's supposed to be doing the same, but he keeps getting distracted by _Maybe God remembered how cute you were as a carrot, _keeps following that statement to a conclusion.

"I was about six when I was a carrot," he says, abruptly, when he can't take the silence any longer.

"Mmm," Olivia says, noncommittal. "I don't remember what I was when I was six. I missed the school play, I know that, and I think that was the year we skipped trick-or-treating. Too much vodka."

He will not be sidetracked. "Kathy doesn't even know I was a carrot."

Unfortunately, Munch has chosen this moment to walk past. "Good thing, too," he cracks. "Wouldn't want her to know her children are half vegetable."

Olivia lifts her head to glare at John the way only woman can. When he has fled she returns to her work.

Elliot shifts, uncomfortable. He should pinch himself. If he's not there to his partner, maybe he's not really there at all. "You talked to my mother."

At this she looks at him, eyes wide in surprise. "What's that? Your mother's alive?"

"Liv –"

"Oh no, that's right, I forgot, you told me about her, let's see, never, all those years ago."

He holds up both hands. "Okay, okay, I get it. You're pissed."

"Took you long enough," she snorts, turning back to her report.

Elliot stares at the top of her head, his own anger mounting. "I've only been back for a day – "

"It took you a day?"

"I don't need this," he snaps, shooting to his feet.

"Oh, you sit your ass back down, Elliot Stabler," she says calmly. "You need this, and now's as good a time as any."

He stands rigid for a moment with his back to her, then draws in a deep breath and sits. She ignores him. Elliot feels rather foolish and hates her for making him feel that way. "Well?" he prompts.

"I'm not going to lecture you, Elliot. We were having a conversation."

Some conversation. He counts to ten, is still annoyed, counts to a hundred by fives, and finally manages to repeat in a reasonably civil tone, "You talked to my mother."

"Mmm." She points her pen at him, still without looking up. "I didn't tell you that. As far as you know, that never happened. Clear?"

"Crystal." At least they're getting into territory he can navigate. "So then Kathleen made a miraculous turnaround."

"She's a good kid."

He shakes his head. His daughter's a good kid all right, a good kid who up until three days ago was hell-bent on her own destruction. "What did you do, Liv?"

Olivia sighs, then says, "Reminded you that you don't get to do these things alone. There are at least three people you should have talked to before returning that necklace, and that's not even counting me."

_Who asked you to get into it?_ he thinks, but he's not mad enough to make the mistake of saying it.

"You going to question my involvement now?"

Damn her and her mind reading. "No," he mutters. "It never would've turned out right without you."

"You're welcome," she says shortly. "Now get your head out of your ass."

In spite of himself he rolls his eyes. "You're pissed."

"No," she scoffs. "Hurt, confused, embarrassed, angry – oh wait, that does add up to pissed. Congratulations, Stabler, you're batting a thousand."

Pissed and sarcastic. Maybe he really did do something wrong. He takes a shot. "Because I never told you about my mother?"

Silence. That's what he gets for hitting a nerve.

"I don't know everything about you, Liv."

"You know all the big important stuff."

"No," he murmurs, thinking of the secret glances she and Fin sometimes share.

"You have the general idea there."

"How you sleeping?"

Caught off guard, she glances up. "Where did that come from?"

Duh, he was following the unspoken conversation. "How you sleeping?" he repeats.

"Better. But we're talking about your problems."

"Yes, ma'am." He pauses. "What are my problems again?"

She's not going for the levity. "That it's not fair. And nothing you can say now can change the fact that all those years we weren't even. That's not a partnership."

His blood runs cold. No. Not again. "What are you saying?"

"Relax. Nothing drastic." This time when she looks at him, he gets the sense that she is letting him see her for the first time all day. "El. Why?"

He honestly doesn't know why, but that's not a good enough answer for those eyes so he gives her one of the rationalizations he's come up with in the past few days. "I don't want to lay any more on you than I have to. You don't need that."

"Maybe I wanted it," she retorts. "Did that ever occur to you?"

"No," he whispers, shaking his head.

"Bastard," she mutters, turning back to her computer screen.

Elliot lets her be for a few minutes, trying to picture what has been going on in this room in his absence. "So," he says finally. "Whose side are the others on this time?"

"Yours," she says promptly, without looking up. "They're sick of me, but they won't say it to my face."

"I wouldn't either."

"Except that you are."

Of course, he's automatically on his own side. Even if he sometimes wishes he weren't. "Fine. You win this one."

"I win in general."

She's got a point and he wants her to stop looking at him like he disgusts her, so he says, "Fine."

"That doesn't earn you any points." Olivia types a final sentence with more force than is strictly necessary. "I'm done and I'm gone."

Elliot keeps his head down and marks her familiar dance between the lockers and desk and coatrack. "You and Kathy," he says as she passes him on the way out, and she turns.

"What was that?"

After a brief internal struggle he raises his face to her. "I'm just gonna have to work my way back into your good graces, aren't I?"

"Yeah, you are," she agrees without a trace of a smile. "Start by doing your half of our report. Oh, and tell Kathy you were a carrot. Good icebreaker, you know, if you ever want to get off the couch. Maybe get her a copy of the picture. 'Cause you did make an adorable carrot, and I am never gonna let you forget it." She hefts her bag higher on her shoulder and heads out the door.

"See you tomorrow?" he calls after her.

"Yeah."

* * *

_Please R&R. Thanks for reading! More will probably come eventually, but not necessarily related to what happened in this chapter. If that makes sense._

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	2. Lunacy

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Disclaimer: Not mine.

_A/N: I've decided, for the sake of sanity, that these posteps cannot possibly be continuous. So this is totally unrelated to the last chapter. This stands unless otherwise stated. And yeah, this took a while because I had trouble understanding Elliot here at all...but my little brother came in handy for once I kind of understand, but I don't really bring it up in the fic so I'll shut up now. Takes place the morning after._

* * *

He's sitting at the kitchen table, nursing a very large mug of coffee, when his son stumbles down the stairs and makes for the garage, emerging after much rummaging with a can of soda. Probably caffeinated. Like Lizzie. After a moment of groggy silence it occurs to Elliot that now might be a good time to have the conversation he's been rehearsing in his head.

"Dick," he says, and frowns. "Shouldn't your sister be up?"

"She gets ready a million times faster than I do."

Momentarily distracted, Elliot tries to figure this out. "But she's a girl."

Dick shrugs. "She doesn't get it either."

"Well, never mind. I need to tell you something."

The kid looks at him warily. "I've already had the talk, Dad."

"Well. I hope so." Elliot draws in a deep breath. "About Dick. Richard. Your namesake."

Pouring himself a bowl of cereal, the younger Dick looks up to grin. "Yeah, he's cool."

"Actually. He's not." Conscious of his son's curious gaze, he tries to smile. "I guess I wasn't such a good judge of character twenty years ago."

"What'd he do?"

"I told you he was helping us with a case, right?"

"Right."

"Yeah. Well, it turns out that he was just trying to throw us off. He killed our girl."

Dick shakes his head, trying to dislodge the idea. "But – "

"Dickie."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah. And believe me, I don't like it any more than you do – "

Dick stands up abruptly and turns away. Elliot pauses to let it sink in, but as the silence grows he mutters, "I wish I'd never dragged anybody into this."

"You only dragged me," his son says sharply, to the opposite wall.

"You and Liv."

"Olivia? But she's your partner. Didn't you kind of have to drag her?"

"Yeah, I guess." He didn't have to fuck it up so badly, though. Last night's scene plays in his head like a bad movie: Olivia all dressed up, taking in the marks of battle on his face, concerned, _Is everything all right?_

_No._

_Who's in the car?_

_Dick Finley._ The dress, the heels, her presence, it all clicked when her jaw dropped.

_You have evidence? _she snapped.

_Do I – what kind of cop do you think I am?_

_The kind who doesn't call his partner when he has a breakthrough on a major case?_

And that he'd had no answer to.

Dick snaps him back. "I guess," he says reluctantly, "I guess you didn't know."

"Of course I didn't."

"And I guess I'm still named after an astronaut, right? I'll just leave out the astronaut-murderer part."

"Might want to leave all of it out," Elliot advises; this after all is why he wanted to tell Dick as soon as possible. "It'll be in the news."

"Crap."

"Watch your mouth."

His son turns to face him, and on his face is half a smile. "No. Lizzie does that for me."

* * *

On the way to work she pulls out her cell phone, thinking vaguely of calling someone, any random acquaintance, or maybe Casey, just to vent; but instead she is confronted with an unsent text message. She remembers writing it – in the small dark hours of the night, the silence and the solitude pressing in from all sides, she had an attack of sentiment, or maybe just claustrophobia, and wrote what she most wanted to ask him: _Is it me?_

That's it. She wants and doesn't want to know. Did she do something to deserve this sudden – _coldness_ from him?

But it's light now, and it's easier to remember that she's mad and he's just being himself, which quite often translates to bastard, and so Olivia deletes the message, gives up on calling anyone, and simply continues on alone.

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_Please R&R._


	3. Babes

_Disclaimer: Nothing you recognize is mine._

_Disclaimer redux: I think that next week's episode (about which I am currently freaking out) would be an ideal opportunity for Elliot and Olivia to clear up all their current crap. Although, what with their being them, there's no guarantee that they'll actually do that. Anyway, this general scene has been bouncing around in my head for a while -- since Olivia seems to me to be slowly falling apart -- and I decided to write it before it becomes obsolete, because after next week it seems that they'll have a whole new pile of crap to deal with. I don't think it would actually happen this way; I'm rooting for them to work it out next week. Also warning: it's National Novel Writing Month, I have no time, and this may suck accordingly._

_Also Elliot kind of references my earlier post-ep "Catch."_

The moment she hears that Fidelia killed herself, the world stops. She pushed her too hard. She saw that girl shrinking into her father's arm and she just kept on railing. She forgot what it was like to be sixteen and moody and to see an endless dreary pattern of days stretch out before you.

Mrs. Bernardi's arrest doesn't help. Neither does the revelation that Fidelia was in fact murdered. The misery keeps clawing at her, dragging her farther down until she can barely see anything outside her head. As though once she let it in for Fidelia, she couldn't shove it back out for everything else.

Olivia becomes increasingly edgy. John and Fin start avoiding her when they can. She spends an impractical amount of time trying to figure out how long it's been since her partner actually looked at her. She drinks too much and takes too many aspirin for the resulting headaches. And at the end of a particularly long day, after her idiot partner has made one comment too many, she slaps her paperwork down on her desk and storms away.

The view from the roof of the precinct is exactly the same as the last time she was up here. There ought to be some sort of comfort in that, but she can't find it. What she finds is that nothing has changed: people still suck and children still die and there is still a need for a Special Victims Unit.

God, she can't breathe.

Olivia backs up against the wall, wishing she thought to bring her coat, and slides down to sit with her knees hugged to her chest. When the door creaks she looks up sharply and spots Munch's ugly head peering out at her.

The disappointment must show on her face, because as he comes over he says, "Elliot's letting you cool off."

"Right," she mutters.

He leans against the railing and looks out over the city. "Nice view."

She snorts and he turns back to her. He too has forgotten his jacket, he notes dispassionately as he lowers himself awkwardly to the ground beside her.

"You okay?" he asks once he's got himself situated.

"What do you think?" she challenges.

John gapes at her until she gives in and asks, "_What?_"

"Well," she manages. "I fully expected you to say 'fine' and then yell at me for asking."

"I don't do that," she protests. "Do I?"

"Yeah, you do. And to answer your question, I think you're pretty damn far from okay."

"Detective work like that, that's why you're the Sergeant," she says, only half sarcastic.

"Hey, Liv. It doesn't take a genius to see you've been going through a rough time. Or should I say, a bunch of rough times one after the other. And it doesn't help that you feel like your partner checked out on you once he hit _his _rough times."

"Wow," she says, startled. "You're more perceptive than you look."

"Yeah, well, that's why I'm the Sergeant."

Olivia cracks a smile and hugs her knees tighter to stave off the cold. "I just," she says without thinking, "I feel like I'm doing it all alone."

"If Stabler's not pulling his weight –"

"I don't mean the job, Munch."

"Oh. Well. Here's a news flash for you: he cares."

"Yeah, right," she snorts. John is silent for so long that she glances sideways at him. "Spit it out."

"Don't eat me?"

Weird way of putting it. "Fine."

"People try to help you, you bite their heads off."

"I – "

"Yes, you do. So Stabler, being of less than exceptional intelligence, has _finally _gotten the message."

"That makes no sense," she mutters since she's afraid that it does make sense.

"Work with me here. You two are sitting at your desks, la di da di da, and you're not okay, and he can see that, but he fully expects that if he says anything you'll say you're fine and yell at him for asking and things will get worse, and that's the last thing he wants. So he waits for you to come to him, except he does have some intelligence so he knows how likely that is, so he's just stuck."

For a moment Olivia sits stunned, then protests, "I do _not _make it that hard."

"Fine." Munch puts his hands up in surrender. "Fine. You win."

She chews on her lower lip. "You really think that's how it is?"

"I don't merely think," he says, insulted. "I know."

"You're being very strange tonight."

"I'm sick of things being strained. You two are like a bad cold, you know that? You're contagious."

"Okay," she laughs, "okay, I'm just going to take that as a compliment since I'm not sure what else to do with it."

"Whatever. Don't tell anyone about the strangeness, okay? Ruin my rep."

The door creaks again over his last words. Olivia stiffens as her partner shoulders his way out, his face unreadable. She looks away. "I shouldn't have snapped."

Hesitantly he crouches before her. "Liv. Don't."

"I'm going to be tactful," John announces.

"Not," Olivia mutters, grinning up at him.

When Munch has left, Elliot looks hopefully at his vacated spot. "Can I sit?"

She nods and he sits, shrugging out of his jacket. "You're shivering," he observes, draping it around her shoulders, one hand remaining protectively on her back.

She knows she's overwrought because this small gesture nearly brings her to tears.

"Anything I can do for you?" he asks gently.

"Not unless you can hold my head together," she says, when what she means is _hold me together; I'm falling apart._

"Headache?"

"Hangover."

"What ever happened to not drinking alone?"

"You weren't fucking there to drink with," she snaps, and real tears spring to her eyes. She lays her head on his shoulder, hoping he won't be able to see.

His hand moves in small circles on her back. "Liv… I'm sorry I wasn't there."

Shit. Shit, she's crying, she's really truly crying and this is not supposed to be happening. Shit. She wishes desperately, selfishly, for a crisis, some disaster that will page them both and enable her to pull herself together, because she can do that for someone else; and Elliot pulls her closer to his side and she just cries.

"Damn you," she says through the tears, "damn you, Elliot, damn you."

"Well," he muses, "I am of less than exceptional intelligence when it comes to these things, so I guess I deserve that."

She jerks away to stare at him. "Fuck, Elliot, how much did you hear?"

Unfortunately for the longevity of her anger, she can still pick out the pain in his eyes. "From the part," he says quietly, "where you honestly believe I don't care." He eyes her, still shaking with cold and half-suppressed sobs, and holds out his arm again. "Liv."

"Shit," she mutters, letting him draw her back to his side. "Shit, El, I – "

"Hey," he says, and because despite recent coldness he is still her partner of eleven damn years, this is all it takes to halt her qualifications and bring her again to real true tears. And because he seems to have unstuck himself from himself, he just sits in silence and lets her cry herself out on his shoulder. He doesn't say anything more, and neither does she, and because of those eleven long years this is enough.

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_Pleasepleaseplease review. _

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	4. Wildlife

Disclaimer: See previous.

A/N: It's still November; therefore I am still short on time, but this couldn't go without some recognition, could it? These chapters are still not related to each other, or to anything except the episode in question.

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_When you're fighting the current  
__You forget how to live_

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The nightmares are expected, but despite the fact that she hasn't had a full night's sleep in about six months, she still hasn't quite got the hang of the nightmare concept. She hasn't worked out how to avoid them, and she definitely has not stopped jerking awake shaking.

Sometimes it's Merrit Rook, or Lauren Cooper shooting herself except that she's wearing Olivia's own face. Most often it's Harris, of course, but the old image of Elliot with a gun to his head has now been all but eclipsed by Elliot on the ground, blood seeping through his shirt, eyes so far gone, and she's too late, always too late.

Elliot and Harris compete for space so that her nightmares become almost as confusing as they are terrifying.

* * *

She calls him once in the middle of the night. At least it feels like the middle of the night to her, since she's been home alone for a while and even slept a bit; but she and Elliot are always on different clocks since he alone of SVU has a family to ground him in something resembling society's time zone. So she calls him in her middle of the night, but really it's ten-thirty and he's been watching TV with the twins and answers on the first ring. "Liv?"

Overwhelmed by the normalcy, she says nothing for a moment, and he grows concerned and prompts, "Liv? You there?"

"Just making sure you're still alive," she says. "Never know with you."

He glances at his children and takes this conversation into the empty kitchen. "Alive and well and breaking up squabbles. You?"

"Nothing nearly so interesting. What did Lizzie do?"

"Well. To be fair, Dick _did _eat her share of dinner."

Olivia laughs and he grins into the phone. "Everything okay, Liv?"

"Yeah, yeah, fine."

"Mmm-hmm."

"Shut up. I'll see you in the morning."

He flashes back to the month eight years ago that he spent on antiretrovirals, Olivia eying him anxiously, _I'll see you tomorrow,_ as though maybe she wouldn't. "Liv, why'd you call?"

"I told you. To make sure you're alive."

"Right."

"I'm serious. You need it."

"Liv?"

"Yeah?"

"Go back to sleep."

"I never said I was asleep."

"Good night."

* * *

What she knows is that the moment she stepped into his hospital room, something clicked. She was joking and he was grinning at her and none of the other crap mattered. It still doesn't matter, and she's glad of this, because once she let the tension evaporate they returned effortlessly to their old pattern.

She doesn't ever want to let anything get in the way of it again. Not as long as he's all she's got.

"You know what I think?" she asks one day as she and her partner are headed into the ME's domain.

"That her boyfriend's the doer?"

"That too. I was going to say that we seem to be allergic to undercover work."

"Allergic," he repeats, amused.

"Yep. Maybe you haven't noticed, but it never turns out well."

"You sound like Munch."

"I try."

Unconsciously he brushes a hand over his sling. "So what are we supposed to do about it?"

Olivia shrugs. "I dunno. Write a memo?"

He grins suddenly. "To all concerned: under no circumstances should Benson and/or Stabler be allowed to undertake any undercover mission – "

"Especially when they ask for it," she finishes. "Look what happened to you."

"Look what happened to _you_," he returns, and she drops her gaze because they haven't talked about Sealview properly. Elliot still doesn't know what happened, only that something happened. She hasn't been able to face telling him, reliving it again, seeing his reaction. She doesn't think she could bear his thinking any less of her.

He claps her gently on the shoulder. "Hey. You don't have to."

She manages a small smile. "El."

"Yep."

_Thank you. I need you. I was so fucking scared for you._

But the best thing about her partnership is that they don't need to say that. "No undercover," she says instead. "Ever again."

"It's self-destructive behavior," he agrees solemnly. "We'll start a support group."

"Undercover Anonymous."

"A twelve-step program."

"What's the first step?"

He glances at her and grins. "We're working on that."

_Us,_ she thinks then, as clearly as if she's read his mind. The first step is just the two of them, forgetting about all their crap, because none of it matters compared to them.

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_Pleeeeease review! And honk if you're frustrated with how the teaser clips never work out the way we think they will._


	5. Persona

_Disclaimer: See previous._

_A/N: The first part isn't exactly a post-ep, I guess, more of a missing moment. I think you'll be able to tell when it takes place. The second part is a bona fide post-ep. And let me just reiterate that this isn't continuous with anything else I've ever written. If it was it'd just be confusing._

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She's sitting at her desk, ostensibly working but really staring at her computer screen, still with a much-too-big NYPD jacket hanging limply from her shoulders. Unnoticed by his partner, Elliot takes exactly two and a half steps into the squad room before spotting her, frowning, and leaving. When he returns with two steaming cups of coffee, she hasn't moved.

_Oh, boy, _he thinks. _Here we go._ He plants himself on her desk. "Rough night?"

She looks up blankly and zeroes in on the coffee. "Yeah. You?"

"Fussy baby rough." He hands her one of the drinks and she cups her hands around it as though she is freezing. "Not…"

"Mia's dead," she says, answering the question he didn't ask.

Elliot closes his eyes briefly, then opens them to eye her bloodstained shirt. "Liv."

"Thanks for the coffee," she says, a dismissal, and takes a sip.

Obediently he gets off her desk and walks around to his own. "You know there wasn't anything more you could have –"

"El –" She holds up a hand to ward him off. "Shut up. Cragen already gave me the whole speech."

"Is that all you think I'm good for?" he asks, insulted. "Giving speeches?"

_Well, _she wants to say, _you're not much good at actually being _there_ so yeah, maybe._ Then she remembers that she's allowed to ask this of him – after all, she talked his mother into helping out, she's backed his play every damn time, she was the one who stood in one spot in a nondescript hospital hallway for God knows how long waiting to hear if he was all right, and what has she gotten in return?

"Where the hell were you?" she demands, because she of all people has the right to do so.

"At home," he says shortly. "Maybe if someone had _called._"

Olivia looks down and begins to consider actually doing her paperwork.

He exhales heavily, leaning across the desk towards her. "Liv. I swear, if I'd've known I'd've come. Okay?"

Feeling slightly stupid, she nods. "Hey," Elliot says gently. "Whose jacket?"

She laughs tightly and confesses, "I have no idea."

_Oh Liv,_ he says silently. He comes around to her side to check the nametag. "Morales."

"Please stop making sense. It makes me feel like an idiot."

"Don't," he says, settling his hands on her shoulders. "It wasn't your fault."

"You don't even know how it happened."

"I know you."

She tips her head back to him, startled, and he squeezes her shoulders. "I'll stop making sense," he says.

"Good," she says, a smile lurking in her eyes. "Sit down and I'll fill you in."

* * *

If there's one thing she knows about herself, it's that she's not good at following her own advice. _You've been lying to him, _she told Linnie. _Doesn't he deserve to know the whole story?_ And she heard the words as though directed at herself, and she knew that she probably wouldn't obey.

And Linnie's husband was not, as it turned out, very forgiving.

Elliot slides into the driver's seat beside her, a motion as familiar as her own footsteps, and she decides that a rhetorical question never hurt anyone. "El?"

He's concentrating on pulling out into traffic. "Mmm?"

"What if I told you I'd been lying to you all these years?"

"God, Liv, if this is about my mom again -- "

"It's not. It's called a rhetorical question. Like Would You Rather."

"Like what?"

"Never mind. Just answer the question."

He chews on his lower lip and peers into the rearview mirror. "What would I do? I dunno. Depend on what it was, probably."

"Hmm." Like she couldn't have guessed that much.

"And," he says, qualifying, "if I knew it was a lie all along, it doesn't count."

"What? Is that a Catholic thing, or…"

Elliot shoots her his most charming grin. "That's little Catholic me in about third grade, coming up with excuses not to tell Father Jerry I'd been lying, because that's what I told him the last time I went to confession."

She bursts out laughing. "So what, you were a pathological liar as a child?"

"Naw, stupid stuff -- you know, like 'I didn't take the last cookie' when Mom knows perfectly well that I took the last cookie." He shrugs. "I didn't fool her, so it wasn't a lie. Voila."

"And when your kids try to pull that one on you?"

"Tell them they're wrong and send 'em to their rooms."

"Catholic morality. Makes so much sense."

"Yeah, actually that's just me. So what's the lie?"

"What lie?"

"The one you've been telling me and suddenly feel guilty about."

Olivia looks straight ahead. "It was a rhetorical question."

"Right."

"I haven't been lying to you for years."

"Uh-huh."

"Months."

"You're not dating a newspaper guy again, are you?"

"Elliot!"

He holds up a hand, looking hastily between her and the road. "Hey, just checking."

She snorts and crosses her arms over her chest. Elliot glances at her; his hand hovers uncertainly in the air before coming to rest on the steering wheel. "C'mon, Liv."

Olivia clears her throat and mumbles, "I told you nothing happened in the basement." She looks quickly up at him, ready to add _at Sealview_, but by the look on his face he knows what she means.

"I'm not stupid," he says.

"I never said you were."

"Hey, I'm your partner. I'd've had to be pretty stupid to buy that one. Doesn't count. You're clear."

Her vision blurs suddenly and she looks away. They are silent until they hit a red light and she feels Elliot's hand on her back and it's wholly ridiculous how that small action makes her feel better.

"Wanna talk?" he asks.

"No."

"Okay."

"The light's green."

He squeezes her shoulder before taking his hand back to drive.

"Okay?" she repeats, surprised that he is letting her off the hook so easily. "Just like that?"

"Yep."

Geez, this is the Elliot she needs around more often. The mental whiplash is going to drive her crazy.

"But if you ever do, you know," he says awkwardly. "Any time. All right?"

"Yeah," she says, thinking that just maybe she should take her own advice more often. It works better on herself.

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_Please review!_

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	6. PTSD

_Disclaimer: See previous._

_A/N: I'm going to assume that you were all similarly outraged by the lack of Elliot and not rant about it here. Apologies for the lateness, as I meant to post yesterday but our car didn't start, effectively cutting off my internet access. And obviously I just kind of made up where Elliot was, but I really want a better explanation…_

* * *

He makes his way into the bullpen in the morning, yawning, pours himself a large mug of coffee, and then is able to register that his partner's desk is unusually tidy. Elliot spends a moment trying to remember the last time that desk was so clean; he settles on the day she disappeared without notice and then he panics.

"Whoa," Fin says bracingly, so that Elliot snaps out of it. "Relax. She's taking some personal time."

"Some what?"

"Personal time."

Elliot shakes his head. "I'm sorry, are we talking about Liv?"

"Yep."

"_Our _Liv?"

"I know," Munch puts in on his way through the room. "Does not compute. You're with me now."

Fin throws a pen at him. "Get out of here, old man."

Very calmly John stoops, picks up the pen, and chucks it back. "As you wish," he says grandly, and disappears into Cragen's office.

Meanwhile Elliot has been zeroing in on Fin. _He knows something._ "What the hell happened?" he demands.

"A very long story which I promised I wouldn' tell," Fin retorts. "Where the hell were you?"

"Extradition," Elliot shoots back. "Funnily enough, I thought I could --" He's glancing back at her desk still and this allows him to cut himself off. _I thought I could trust you to watch her back for me._

"Could what?" Fin challenges.

Elliot exhales deeply and lowers himself into his desk chair. "Trust me. You don't want me to finish that sentence."

Apparently this functions as a signal, because Fin deflates and comes to occupy Olivia's chair. "Look," he says, "I know it wasn' your fault -- but someone" -- he gestures vaguely at the air -- "something up there has amazingly awful timing."

"That bad, huh?"

"Bad enough that Cap'n noticed an' told her to take the time." Fin pauses and considers him. "I still think you're a bastard."

"Most people do," Elliot says, sensing that more is coming.

"But…" Fin's picking over his words a hell of a lot more than he usually does. "I dunno how to watch her right. Not the way you can."

"Well," Elliot says uncomfortably. "You shouldn't have to."

"Right," Fin scoffs, "I watch out for mine. Right. 'Least I kept Liv from pullin' a Lake."

Elliot stares at him. Maybe he's forgotten what exactly a "Lake" means. "What?"

The instant guilt on Fin's face is almost comical. "I wasn't supposed to tell you that."

Elliot mutters a few choice words and snatches up his cell phone. "How long's she been out?" he asks while it rings.

"Coupla days," Fin says, standing and leaving him to tally up the time he was away, try to figure out if it was longer than he through or she just fell that fast.

She finally picks up after a dozen rings. "I was trying to sleep," she informs him.

At least she's herself enough to tell him off. "Hey," he says inadequately.

"Hey yourself. You back in town?"

"Yeah. What is this? You're sticking me with Munch?"

"You stuck me with Fin," she says blithely. "It's only fair."

Elliot considers having an argument over which of the pair is easier to work with, but the squad room probably isn't the place. "Well," he says instead. "You up for company tonight?"

"I'm not an invalid," she says, real irritability now creeping into her tone. "And I'm guessing I don't have a choice anyway."

"Liv," he says, affronted. "You always have a choice. You could leave me outside int the cold."

"Go back to work, Stabler," she says, and hangs up.

* * *

Personal time is overrated. In two days holed up in her apartment Olivia has discovered what she already knew: she _needs_ to work. She needs the distraction and she needs the companionship, because she's no longer comfortable with herself.

On the upside, she can get to the bottom of a carton of ice cream without being interrupted. She is in the middle on one when the door buzzes and she wanders over to let Elliot in. While she waits for him to come up she leans against the wall and thinks about cleaning up. She decides against it. Neatness is also overrated.

Elliot knocks and she swings the door wide, propping it open with her hip. "The prodigal partner returns," she observes.

Taken slightly aback, he holds up the plastic bags in his hands. "I brought movies." He eyes the ice cream she's still holding. "And real food."

"I have real food. Some." Olivia sighs and starts for the kitchen. "Might as well come in," she calls over her shoulder.

The door clicks shut and then his footsteps follow hers. She savors the sound. Stupid how she only notices these things after their absence.

"Eli's got a cold and Kathy's cranky for no apparent reason," he says, setting the bags on her counter. "So you're basically harboring a fugitive. For as long as possible, please."

"Right. That's why you're here."

"Yep."

"You're a terrible liar."

He ignores her and pokes into his own bags. "I brought us sandwiches. And movie theater candy, because it was on sale at the video place."

"Some real food."

"It's chocolate."

"Well, that's all right then." She gives up on the ice cream and stuffs it back into the freezer. "So how's this supposed to work, Elliot? You show up at last and I get all emotional and tell you everything? Is that it?"

Elliot leans heavily on the counter. "Look, Liv," he says, addressing his elbows. "If you really don't want me here I'll go."

But she does want him here. She wanted him here four days ago when everything was falling to pieces.

"You don't have to tell me anything if you don't want to," he says cautiously.

"I don't."

"That's settled, then."

She stands immobile for a moment, then comes over to investigate the other bag he brought. "What movies did you get?"

"After much deliberation… some sports flick, and _National Treasure 2._ Because Lizzie loved it. And you and she share a lot of tastes."

"Okay," she says doubtfully. "Let's go where the TV is."

"Take your sandwich."

She's feeling slightly sick from all the ice cream, but she takes the bag anyway.

* * *

By the end of the first movie she's stretched out on the couch half asleep and Elliot, who has been very conscious of giving her "space," is on the floor leaning up against said couch. They made fun of the film all the way through until the end, which was cheesy and over-the-top and somehow sobering, and then they fell silent.

"Put in the next one," she murmurs.

"I can't work your player."

"Well, _I'm _not moving."

But then the credits disappear and the screen goes black, plunging the room into darkness, and she has one of those sudden awful moments when her breath catches and panic flows into _what the hell is wrong with me?_ Olivia fumbles between the cushions for the remote and finds a TV channel. "El?"

"Yeah."

"Why'd you come?"

"Why not?"

"That's not an answer."

"I hate this show," he says, although she'd bet that he's never seen it before. "Lemme look."

She surrenders the remote and he flips through the channels, finally settling on an unidentifiable Christmas movie. The awkwardness grows between them for a few minutes until he abruptly turns the volume down. "I gotta tell you something."

"Uh-oh. How worried should I be?"

"Not bad news or anything. Just. You should know."

She gets the feeling that he's very glad not to have to look at her right now.

"I," he says hesitantly, "I'm trying, I swear. Because I knew, after Sealview, I knew -- not everything, obviously, because I still don't. But you gotta give me a little credit here, you know, I can tell when you been hurt."

"Elliot -- " she starts to protest, but he cuts her off.

"No. You didn't want to talk, remember?"

"No fair," she grumbles.

"Your fault." He pauses. "I guess what I'm saying is that I wanna help you, Liv, but I don't know how. So I figured being company was better than nothing."

She drops a hand off the couch to lay on his shoulder. Because he can be a jerk, all right, but he's not _that _bad.

Elliot starts at the contact but continues to avoid her eyes. "You don't have to talk about it," he says quickly, as though anxious to reassure her on this point. "But you can."

She considers this as he turns the TV back up. But thinking about talking about it involves thinking about _it, _and on the screen a little girl is walking along a wrought-iron fence, banging her hand against the bars, and just like that she's hearing a different voice in her head.

She doesn't realize that her fingers are digging into his shoulder until he settles a gentle hand over hers, jolting her back to reality. He turns to look at her. "Hey, Liv, you okay?"

The sympathy in his eyes is almost too much to bear. She can't speak. This is not the first time she's gone back _there_, but never before has she had something to hang on to.

Elliot, under his new damned crusade to be understanding, merely pries her grip off his shoulder and laces his fingers through hers and watches the movie.

* * *

They're just getting to Christmas morning when he realizes that his partner is fast asleep. Cursing to himself, Elliot turns off the television and considers his predicament. He really should go home, but he can't leave without saying goodbye any more than he can wake her up right now.

After standing indecisive for a moment he goes into the kitchen, calls home, and feeds Kathy the usual line about having caught a case and not being sure when he'll be back. Yes, he says, he does have a few minutes to talk, and he's rewarded with the stories of Lizzie's history project and Eli's attempt to crawl up the stairs and what is Dick's trouble with geometry?

He's barely hung up and resettled himself and found a football game to watch with the volume low when Olivia starts to mutter. Even so it takes him several minutes to register the soft litany of "please, no" from behind him; when he does he snaps into action, shaking her awake. "Liv. Liv."

With a gasp she bolts upright, trembling. Elliot takes a cautious seat on the edge of the couch, still holding her by the shoulders. This might not be the brightest idea but the urge to gather her close and comfort her is too strong to entirely deny. "Hey," he murmurs, "hey, Liv, look, it's okay."

"Elliot," she whispers, glassy-eyed.

"I'm here." God, he hates it when she looks at him like that. He wants to assure her that she's safe now. He wants her to believe it, preferably without his having to say anything at all.

She's desperately searching his face for something, he's not sure what, but evidently she finds it because she relaxes by degrees and squares her shoulders. "I'm okay."

He runs his hands down her arms briefly, then lets her go. _Don't lie to me, Liv._ "You sure?"

Olivia draws her knees up to her chest, tantamount to an admission of how far from okay she is, and nods. "You should get home."

"You sure?" he asks again, feeling rather like a broken record.

"I'm fine. I swear."

Yeah, right. Thirty seconds ago she was shaking so hard that _he _was shaking. Elliot looks her up and down, sighs, and stands. "You call me if you need anything, all right?"

She nods again, very small but with her face determined. He summons a smile and turns away. Her voice catches him at the door. "El."

"Yeah."

"I'm in therapy."

He turns slowly to find her still sitting there, hugging her legs with her chin lifted high, waiting for his reaction. "Liv," he says helplessly.

"I still don't want to talk about it. I just…want you to know that."

"Why?"

"Elliot."

He winces. "I mean, why the sudden urge to tell me?"

A smile flits across her face. "Because it came out on this case, and I wouldn't want you to get jealous that Fin knew first."

He grins sheepishly and stuffs his hands into his pockets. "Well, that's good, Liv, glad to hear it."

"No," she says thoughtfully, "I'm terrible at it."

"At therapy? I don't think that's possible."

"It is. It's a talent."

"You're doing fine," he tells her, meaning it. "Hang onto those movies. I'll come by tomorrow and we can finish them."

"You know it's bad manners to invite yourself over, right?"

"What, you don't want me here?"

"I didn't say that."

So this is how it's going to be. Push and pull, neither of them reading each other so much as instinctively knowing.

He can work with that. "G'night, Liv."

"Go home."

Push. He goes.

* * *

_Reviews are very much appreciated…especially since I worked hard on this one. So please, drop a line. Thanks for reading!_


	7. Smut

_Disclaimer: See previous._

_A/N: Sorry that this is short and all. The episode left me decidedly uninspired. Not that I didn't like it; I just didn't know what to do with it._

* * *

He's been watching her. Not in a creepy way, he rationalizes to himself, in a worried way, but in any case this is why his heart leaps perversely when she tells him no, she isn't okay. Because for six months now he's been watching her spiral downward, and now he gets to watch her pull herself up.

The ways he knows are too many and insignificant to count, but they include the dressing down she gave Fin when he called her a prude. They include the fleeting stay-out-of-this look she stopped him with when Laurel Andrews blamed her for his decision. They include the fact that all day now he has not felt her falter.

"What?" she demands, and he realizes that he's been watching her, literally, across their desks.

"Nothing," he says quickly, and clears his throat. "I mean, congratulations."

"Thanks," she says automatically, assuming he's referring to the perp she just cornered. Then she frowns, suspicious. "What for?"

"Um," he mutters, unable, so pinned by her gaze, to recall the guy's name. Damn, she really is getting better. "You know. Things. Er. In general."

"Everything okay? Kids okay?"

"Fine." He coughs. "Why?"

"Because you're acting very strange."

"Oh. Well, ignore me."

"Okay," she says doubtfully as Munch sweeps into the squad room. She turns to give him the Look instead. "John, where you been?"

"Around," Munch says vaguely. "You keep missing me, not the other way around."

"Well, that's nice to say."

"Aw, now don't get all touchy all of a sudden. I didn't mean it like that and you know it."

"If I know it, why would I 'get all touchy'?" Olivia wants to know.

Meanwhile Elliot has recovered enough to add, "She's just pissed 'cause your partner thinks she's a prude. Don't mind her."

"I thought it was you we were ignoring," she shoots back.

Elliot can't quite contain the grin, so he directs it at Munch, who is thoroughly nonplussed. "Wow," he says feelingly. "I must have missed something."

"Haven't you heard?" Olivia asks lightly. "It's impossible to take a day off lately without missing _everything._"

Elliot wonders if this is supposed to mean something, but he can't bring himself to spoil the mood by asking.

"Clearly," Munch says, "I missed that."

She laughs, such a nice sound that both men find themselves laughing with her and she stops to give them a strange look. Instantly they quiet. His partner's staring him down and still Elliot can't suppress the smile. Olivia shakes her head and stands, shuffling her paperwork together. "Men," she says, long-suffering, and turns towards Cragen's office.

"Liv," he says. "Laurel Andrews."

"What about her?"

"She's gonna be fine."

* * *

_Please review!_


	8. Stranger

_Disclaimer: See previous._

_Anybody else have a heartstopping moment when you thought they were really mad at each other?...So did the captain._

* * *

There are a lot of things about his team that make Don proud. Their skill, their closure rate, their willingness to follow the cases others would abandon – once in a while someone mentions these things and he swells, the compliment all the sweeter because he has grown used to his detectives and forgotten how amazing they really are.

He is just as happy as they are for every commendation, promotion, job well done. But they get him in trouble often enough, too, that he figures they cancel out. It's not the closed cases that he is most proud of, after all – it's what gets them there, day after grueling day. He knows his team, and they know each other, and the whole web is as comfortable as his favorite pair of shoes.

They are never recognized for their camaraderie, but Don doesn't particularly care. His team trusts each other implicitly; they stick together; they bounce back from the most vicious arguments without apology, merely returning to work side by side. Don is absolutely certain that, without this strange family dynamic, they simply could not do this job.

He _knows_ them. He does.

Which is why he is profoundly disturbed that he could not tell whether Elliot and Olivia were putting on a show or were deadly serious.

_That was a little too convincing, _he said, when really he was praying that they were acting.

_It was brilliant,_ Olivia contradicted, and he was relieved but not completely. Maybe if she'd actually smiled.

Then again, that's about as close to smiling as Benson gets these days.

They're slow now, they've been given some breathing space, and he's looking through the glass of his office, watching the four of them. Finishing up paperwork. Talking among themselves – fact-checking, he supposes, or joking, or telling stories. It's not all that uncommon for him to look out at them like this, a pensive glance here and there. It makes him feel pleasantly like a father, checking up on his children. But in years past it was different. Years ago they all laughed more. Once he'd looked out the window like this, dreading the bad news he had to tell them. Monique was there, not Fin, but in any case they were all laughing, and he wished they wouldn't because it made him feel so guilty.

Now he just wants that laughter back.

He wants to be able to tell, dammit. If he can't tell whether one's bluffing, how is the other supposed to?

The thought frightens him. His team is built on that rock-solid connection between partners, between them all. They cannot – they _must_ not lose it.

Don leans his forehead against the glass. As an afterthought he gropes for the blinds and closes them. He stands like that, turning things over in his mind, until he has picked the truths out from their act. _Screw you _struck a nerve, because he hears it a lot when Elliot and Olivia really are pissed at each other. Then there was the bit about castration with a rusty steak knife – she meant that. Don can tell, as always, that Olivia harbors a special hatred for this particular perp. She wouldn't have said it if not for the ploy, but that didn't stop her from meaning it.

It's okay. He gets all that. He gets that Elliot and Olivia are staggeringly good actors.

But what Elliot said next, _I think you need a sick day, _he meant that too. On some level. Partners are ferociously and sometimes backwardly protective of each other. It falls under the strange family thing they've got going.

So there's that. And sexual harassment may be much lesser but it still sounds unsettlingly like sexual assault. So although rationally he knows that their relationship would have to disintegrate about a million times further for any lawsuits to be filed, Olivia's final jab hits too close to home.

He's read her and Fin's Sealview reports until his eyes blur, but it hasn't got him any closer to figuring out what to do.

He can pick their words apart for truth, but he could not pick it out at the time. And if he's lost that ability, what's to say they haven't?

From outside his little cocoon, laughter draws his attention; he peers through the blinds. By the way John is grinning, he's told the joke. Or the off-the-wall theory. Fin and Elliot are still laughing, shaking their heads, Elliot heading back from the coffeepot with two mugs. He passes one to Olivia, resting a hand briefly on her shoulder before sitting down.

That's what Don's forgotten. That's what's to say they can still read each other: they're partners. That should mean a lot, and with his detectives, it really does.

Olivia is not quite laughing with them, but the smile that's lit her face is unmistakably genuine.

Don draws in a breath and turns away from the window. It's not quite the same, but it's a start, and it's time to get on with their lives.

* * *

_Pleeeease R&R...I'm going out of town. I'll be back Sunday, hopefully having worked on Belief some...review and I'll update. :D I love blackmail._

* * *


	9. Transitions

_Disclaimer: See previous._

* * *

They are thinking about transitions these days, about new people and new positions and new ways of life. Charged though the case has been, in the unit there is an air of admiration for Hailey, so young and so willing to plunge headfirst into a new and terrifyingly difficult reality. Sometimes they wish they were so strong.

While reviewing testimony Kim asks Melinda if Benson and Stabler always think with one mind. Warner's eyes light up. Not lately, she says, not for a long time, when did this happen? And Kim says Yesterday, they wanted me to plead her out, I just looked at them and I could tell, hasn't it always been that way. And Melinda says No, and Kim begins to realize how much she has left to learn.

Elliot lends half an ear to the complaints his twins trade over their homework and discovers that while Dick is struggling with reaction mechanisms and transition states, Lizzie is having her brother explain the Protestant Reformation. In this vein he spends more time with his second child. He tries to actually listen to what she's saying. He thinks maybe she notices.

Meanwhile Fin is muddling through the particulars of how Hailey will transition, a process he finds morbidly fascinating; Munch is trying to figure out how the hell he wound up alone, and Olivia is thinking that she may have actually adjusted to life _after._

* * *

"Where've you been?" Olivia asks when Munch walks into the room. She frowns in thought. "I feel like I'm asking you that every time I see you."

"Clearly you have abandonment issues."

"He was hidin' from this case," Fin says sympathetically, "that's why he keeps leavin' you."

"So sorry, darling," Munch says airily.

"Relax." Elliot winks at his partner, who actually looks a little bit insulted. "I mean, it's understandable. Gender reassignment surgery didn't _exist_ when Munch was a kid."

"Back when surgery meant choppin' your leg off on a battlefield," Fin adds.

"True," Munch says solemnly. "Why, I remember when they finally decided to give the public access to the idea of antiseptic…"

Cragen pokes his head out to give them all a stern look, and by tacit agreement they settle down, although Fin is heard to grumble, "Can't even let us make fun of him without bringing cover-ups into it."

"Munch _is_ gone an awful lot," Elliot tells her later. "I noticed too."

Olivia rolls her eyes. "You don't need to tell me I'm right, El. I know."

"And you're so modest, too."

"I know."

"So do old men hit on you a lot?"

"That, my friend, is what we call a cheap shot." Olivia twirls a pen absently, frowning at the stack of old case reports before her. "You're just mad you're not pretty enough to be a dancer."

"I can come up with better shots if you want."

"No thank you," she says, laughing.

These moments of normalcy still hit him over the head sometimes. They were scarce for a while, a long while, and then they came back, and he can't figure it out but he doesn't really care what kind of transition he and his partner have made. What's important is that it happened.

Sensing his pensiveness, Olivia looks up. "Thinking about Eli?"

"Trying to figure out what his girl's name would be."

"I see your problem," she says seriously. "Elizabeth's already taken."

He smiles. He has been thinking about Eli a bit, but he reached the same conclusion as he told Hailey: that it would be hard, if his kid turned out different, and undoubtedly he'd screw it up because he excels at screwing things up, but he couldn't stop loving his children if he tried. So he stopped musing over Eli and thought instead about Kathleen.

"How _are _the kids these days?" Olivia asks, as though she's read his mind.

"Pretty good. Maureen got a new job. Lizzie doesn't get why Dick can't do chemistry, but he has to explain their history homework to her so they finally called it even."

"And Kathleen?"

She knows him too well. Elliot shakes his head but can't stop a slight smile. "She's doing a lot better."

"That's great."

"Yeah." He props his chin on one hand. "I never thanked you properly for helping her."

"I gave up on getting thanks from you a long time ago," she says, only half joking. "But you're welcome anyway."

Antsy all of a sudden, he stands and grabs his coat, "I'm gonna go for coffee. Want some?"

"Please. I don't think I'll make it through these reports otherwise."

"I've got the other half of the reports," he reminds her, already at the door. "Hence coffee."

* * *

"How _do_ you do it?" Munch asks his partner.

"Do what?"

"Have all these plans for a kid, and then have him tell you he wants something completely different."

There is a beat of silence while they both think of Ken, and then Fin says, "Man, it's your _kid_," as though that explains everything.

* * *

_Pleeeeeease review!...cuz I am having the Week From Hell._


	10. Lead

_Disclaimer: See previous._

* * *

"You're pensive."

Olivia starts and smiles guiltily at Alex. "Sorry, what?"

"Pay attention to me," Alex orders, batting her glass from hand to hand. If she gets much more nervous, Olivia figures, she'll start twirling on the barstool.

She doesn't want to make her old friend anxious, really she doesn't, but she has been trying to figure out what is so inherently awkward about their situation. Alex has come back into her life like a spring breeze, like the smell of her mother's perfume, like a dance tune from the eighties. She doesn't know why this is so.

"I'm sorry already," Alex says.

Olivia blinks at her. "For what?"

"For whatever." Alex shrugs and peers closely at her glass, as though it holds all the answers. "Not calling."

"Well," Olivia says.

"I don't know. You two seemed pretty thrown."

It takes her a moment to process the reference. "Well, yes," she concedes, "but could you not refer to me and Elliot as one person, thank you."

Alex lifts an eyebrow. "That's pretty much the way I remember it, Liv. You never minded before."

It is then that she realizes how very much Alex has missed. In five years things happened that they had never dreamed of. Kathy and Elliot split up, and so did she and Elliot, twice. Simon happened, and Eli, and Sealview. And here's Alex, a spring breeze, a living memento of happier times, before Gitano and Cooper and Lake, before the sheer madness pushed them all that much closer to the edge.

"Things change," Olivia mutters before realizing how very much she sounds like her partner.

Ever the prosecutor, Alex considers this, incorporates it into her worldview. "He said something funny today."

"Did he."

"He seems to think you've been unhappy lately."

_Define lately,_ she wants to say. _Define unhappy. Tell me exactly what he's thinking._ But instead she says, "Elliot's weird."

"You sound twelve."

"Maybe because I just interviewed half a dozen twelve-year-olds. All of whom support our vic's story. You're welcome."

"Thank you," Alex says solemnly, and changes the subject. "Tell me a story."

"Now you sound five."

"That's how long I've been away and I'm sure I missed a lot of good stories." Suddenly her eyes light up. "Tell a Munch story. Those are always good."

They are, still, and so Olivia does tell the Munch stories. She mixes up a few of the times and tells a few that Alex already knows, but she doesn't seem to mind.

* * *

"Some things never change," Alex says happily at one point, still laughing.

_Oh yes, _Olivia thinks, _but some things do._ "So how does it feel to be back?"

"Back." Alex grins. "It feels like I never left."

This is what sets Alex apart, now: the rest of them are acutely aware that she left, and shit happened; and no matter how nice it is to let Alex help them forget, they can't ever go back.

Maybe if she hadn't spent three years avoiding them. But it's too late now. The rest of them know what Alex doesn't.

At least, Olivia does.

* * *

_Sadly I cannot think of anywhere to go from here, nor do I have the time to figure it out. Thanks for reading anyway...please review!_


	11. Ballerina

_Disclaimer: See previous. Disclaimer redux: This might suck...chalk it up to the fact that I wrote most of it on a school bus by flashlight._

* * *

She never gets tired of making dramatic entrances. Elliot doesn't either; she can tell. She can feel his barely repressed excitement when they're hovering outside a door, waiting to hear that damning incrimination. He's such a child sometimes.

They're both good actors, though. They have to be. It would be highly unprofessional to be smiling while making an arrest.

After they shove Chet into the back of the sedan, Elliot grins at her over the top of the car. "I know I shouldn't," he starts, shaking his head, "but…"

She smiles back because she knows. True, there is something infinitely sad about Chet, but there's also something that makes one need to laugh. Really hard.

* * *

Unfortunately her colleagues have the same attitude towards Birdie. Olivia does not find anything in the old woman's story remotely amusing. Mostly she sees someone who shares her rare ability to attract a succession of awful men. Although sometimes she lets herself think, _well, at least she married them. _

In a few days it will go away, she knows. But for now she's just been reminded how good she is at ignoring her problems.

She deserves a medal or something. Her partner's a bastard (to some people, anyway), and she's in denial. What a pair.

* * *

"The thing is," Fin says, "with all those marriages you'd think she could make one work."

Not again. Olivia closes her eyes and prays for them to stop. The proverbial horse is so long dead.

"Like you're a great role model," Elliot retorts.

Cue Munch: "Believe it or not, I'm not the only one of my serial-marriage species."

The guys have had at least three very similar conversations. But Birdie is the most interesting case they've had in weeks; what else is there to talk about? She wishes they'd find something else anyway.

"I promise you," Fin tells his partner, "you _are_ one of a kind."

"Am not."

"Are so."

"Children!" Elliot barks in his best imitation of their captain. "Please. It's _hard_ to make a marriage work."

"Says the only one of us who still has one," Fin mutters.

"Maybe if she hadn't always picked such jerks," Munch muses.

"What, is that what happened to you?"

"_No._"

At about this point they usually get interrupted, but much to Olivia's chagrin the phones remain silent, Cragen's door closed. She allows herself a small sigh and Elliot glances across at her, frowns.

It's about time.

"I've come to the conclusion," Munch says with a grand air, "that _I _am the common factor in all my failed marriages."

Olivia flips a page, feeling the heat of her partner's gaze. What she wants to say is, _You'd think John of all people would understand. And shut up._

"Brilliant," Fin says dryly. "Which brings us back to, why did she marry them in the first place?"

"Maybe she didn't know," Elliot cuts in abruptly. "Maybe she just wanted to _have _someone. I forgot to ask, did we ever get the phone dump back on Krystal Jiang?"

Munch and Fin both stare at him. "We went over that four hours ago," Munch says, looking to Olivia for support, but she knows what her partner's doing so she ignores them all.

"Well, then," Elliot says, "clearly I need to go over it again."

* * *

He's on his way out early in an attempt to catch a parent-teacher conference – he'll probably be late anyway – but before he goes he leans down over Olivia's shoulder, propping an arm on her desk so the others can't hear. "So there's no one in your life I'd wanna know about, huh?"

All right, she has to give him a little credit for that. "If there were I'd tell you," she informs him. "Next time I'm accused of passing information to the press you're gonna be able to back me up."

"Who says there's gonna be a next time?"

"Knowing me, there will be."

Elliot tuts softly. "Call me, if – "

"I'll see you tomorrow."

* * *

She is excellent at ignoring her problems. And every time she ignores this particular problem, she wastes precious time.

_She's who I used to be, _Birdie said. And there's another of Olivia's (most often ignored) problems: who did _she_ used to be? She can't remember, anymore.

* * *

_Pleeeeeease review!_


	12. Hell

_A/N: I attend a Jesuit school that is very big on social justice. As a freshman I joined Amnesty International. It has never let me go. I was thrilled to see such an under-reported issue on SVU. This may be as much a mini-rant as a post-ep, but...I had to bring Olivia in. Enjoy!_

* * *

After the priest leaves Elliot remains. A party of one. He lets the pictures flash by, the only light in the darkened squad room, even though they're already engraved on his soul, the children.

A small boy looking up with huge eyes. An older one leveling a machine gun. A group of young women at a refugee camp. They have seen unimaginable terrors, been uprooted from their homes. They are smiling so widely that their teeth flash white, that their faces might break.

_To make people see all the child soldiers._ He's seeing. And seeing. And seeing.

When Olivia comes in she has the sense not to say anything. Elliot doesn't even glance her way, but he hears her settling on top of his desk. The slightest squeak indicates that she's propped her feet up on his chair. He can feel that she is watching with him. Such a small thing. It makes his throat tighten.

At length he does turn around. She simply looks at him for a moment, then offers a twisted smile, the kind they use when they only wish there were reason to be happy. "It's late," she says.

"I... lost track of time."

She nods and looks past him at the screen, her face soft in the flickering light. "Elijah got to you."

He shrugs and rubs his arms. One hand hovers over his old Marine tattoo; Olivia is much too sharp to miss this.

"You never really talk about the Marines."

Because she most often knows best he considers this, then shakes his head. "It's not the same, Liv. I only tried to convince him it was."

Olivia accepts this without comment, propping her chin in her hands. "It _isn't_ because you prayed with him, is it?"

"I've prayed with some scumbags before," he points out. "It's not restricted to good people."

She nods quietly. "I thought so." After a heavy pause she prompts gently, "El?"

Instead of answering he turns back around, almost wishing that she's just go away. From the screen a child with a rifle slung over one shoulder looks solemnly back at him.

There is a soft thud, and then his partner is standing beside him.

* * *

"Did you know," she says after several minutes of silence, "that up to ninety-five percent of your wardrobe was made in a sweatshop?"

Slowly he turns to look at her. _What?_

_It's true,_ she indicates with a jerk of the head. "Do you know how many children there are in the world, El?"

He just stares at her.

"A little over two billion. Know how many of them live in poverty?"

If he did he'd feel less stupid right now.

"About one billion," she says. "Nearly half. Half of the total population lives on less than two dollars a day. Some estimates say that the amount of money spent on ice cream in _one year_ could end world hunger."

He wonders if this is supposed to make him feel better. He'll never buy ice cream again.

Olivia regards him sympathetically. "The Sudanese government just kicked out a bunch of peacekeepers and aid workers. Of course, they were the ones killing and raping their own people in the first place. Israel killed hundreds of innocent people in response to five or six casualties and calls it self-defense. And they're doing it with American tax dollars. There's a school in Georgia that's teaching Latin American soldiers how to make war on their own civilians." At his frown she adds, "Yes, I do mean our Georgia. And Gitmo? There's at least two guys in there who were minors when incarcerated and have been cleared for release by the government."

Finally he finds his voice. "And they're still holding 'em?"

She nods. "Makes Munch seem a lot less crazy, doesn't it?"

Elliot blinks at her. It makes Munch seem normal. It makes her seem…well, this Olivia, after all.

"Those activists," he says at length, shaking his head. "They _did _something to you in Oregon."

Obligingly she laughs a little, steps towards the screen. "Once you get into it, El, you can never quite get out."

This he understands already, from his first day on this job, the first time he held Maureen, from the day Kathy said yes, the day Olivia first caught his eye across the room to share a private joke. When something touches your soul, it stains – indelible ink.

"That was environmental, though," he says hesitantly. He's surprised he still remembers this and not entirely sure he's remembered it right.

"Yes. It's all the same, really." She turns toward him, chewing her lower lip. "A girl there was always quoting some cardinal at me, I forget his name, but the idea was it's all one issue – the environment, poverty, abortion, everything. It's a life issue."

"The consistent ethic of life."

"That's it!"

"It's a Catholic thing," he says before she can ask how he knows that.

"Of course." Olivia rolls her eyes but quickly sobers. "You can't really deal with it all, though, can you?"

Elliot shrugs: he doesn't know and he wouldn't feel comfortable disagreeing with her right now anyway.

"Sometimes I can't decide which is more important," she says softly. "The environment, or the human rights. Because this stuff, it's…" She glances back at the progression of children on the screen and trails off.

"Unspeakable," he supplies.

"Yeah," she murmurs. "And there's so much to do, and it's not _fair_… but on the other hand, some people would tell you that if we don't fix the planet now, soon there won't _be_ any people to worry about."

The despair that's been coursing through his veins is mirrored in her voice. He can't stand it.

"That's why God made so many activists," he says after a moment, trying for some levity. "So that every cause has a voice."

To his surprise a wide grin breaks across her face. "You learn fast, Stabler."

"What?"

"You can't deal with it all," she informs him. "You and me, El, we've got a cause already. There are things you can do to help these kids, and you should. But you can't lose sight of the good you already do."

This makes far too much sense. "You tricked me," he says accusingly. Pretending that she needed his advice. Oh, she's good.

"Oh, grow up."

Elliot tilts his head to consider her. "How come you make so much more sense than a priest?"

"Because you've known me for a lot longer than Father Theo?"

He sighs gustily. "Stop making sense."

Olivia laughs and shuts down the screens. "It's late," she says again. "Let's call it a night, okay?"

It's dark without the light from the pictures. Elliot squints to see her through the gloom. "Buy you a drink?"

"Thanks, but let's try tomorrow. You need to go home."

He brings his watch close to read the time: past midnight. "Fine," he says. "You win." As usual.

* * *

_Okay, so, the facts that Olivia comes out with: some I looked up online. The sweatshop line is direct from Jim Keady's presentation on Nike sweatshops in Indonesia, where workers can afford about a meal and a half a day (teamsweat dot org). A few things I just remembered (after four years of weekly AI meetings things start to stick with you). The bit about ice cream I read in the Loyola University Museum of Art. And the consistent ethic of life is a real thing developed by Cardinal Joseph Bernardin to encompass life issues from abortion to nuclear weapons. (My ethics teacher would love this.) _

_There is an organization working on behalf of the children in Uganda: Invisible Children. (invisiblechildren dot com) They held a screening at my school a couple years ago. I highly reccomend watching the film if you can. Your life will never be quite the same._

_All that being said...please review!_


	13. Crush

_A/N: Okay, here it is: the post-ep for that eppy from two weeks ago. :/ Some things just needed to be said about that. Enjoy._

* * *

She finished her paperwork twenty minutes ago, but she's been rereading the same file for all that time and the cover seems to be working. At least no-one has mentioned that she's not doing actual work. Then again it's such an anomaly that there's no reason to suspect.

Home is calling, she supposes, home and her couch and a carton of ice cream – no, she's out, she'll have to buy some on the way. She probably _should _go home. Sleep. But hell, she knows perfectly well that she won't be able to sleep tonight. She might as well kill the time here at her own desk across from her partner.

She's fine. Really, she is. But she doesn't have to _like_ being cuffed and manhandled and locked in a cage. Actually she really hates it. So now she just wants to be near him for a while, so that maybe she can remember who she is.

"You're looking at me funny," he says, without lifting his head from his own paperwork.

"That's some kid you raised," she shoots back. She's had this comment ready for a while, on the off chance that he would notice anything strange about her.

"What, Kathleen?"

She never talked to him about bringing Kathleen with her; instead she went straight to the girl and her mother. These days it's easier to deal with Kathy. She should have known Elliot would get wind of it so soon. The man always knows more than he lets on.

"She gets it from her mother's side," Elliot says, taking her silence as an affirmative.

"I don't doubt that." She almost laughs. Not quite. Nothing's funny about the situation, really, because it hurt to hear her partner's daughter talk about how she'd been abused, while everyone who could have helped her – including Olivia herself – had been blind.

But God, it was good to spend some time with the new Kathleen, a poised, confident girl with her priorities straight. There's nothing funny about that either.

"She was a big help," she tells Elliot. What she's thinking is that these words are not adequate to describe Kathleen's transformation, but he looks up in surprise.

It's been a while, she supposes, since he's heard anything good about his second child. She should have thought of that earlier. "Oh, El," she says, just loudly enough for him to hear. "You know she's a good kid. She's one of yours."

Now he's really staring at her, but she can't figure out why she said that either. One of his? The man acted as though her brief incarceration was a personal affront but never bothered to ask if she was all right.

Kathleen is a good kid at heart; so are her siblings. But at this point, Olivia's inclined to think they got it all from their mother.

Elliot ducks his head. She thinks he's smiling but she's cursing herself for needing to be near him. She's pathetic, is what she is. Did she really need to remember _that?_

Now she does want to go home. "I'm done," she announces, shoving the practically-memorized file into her stack of completed work.

"That was fast."

"No," she retorts, feeling contrary, "you're slow." She finds her bag and is partway out the door when his voice calls her back.

"Liv?"

"What?"

He swivels around and tips his head up to meet her eyes. "You okay?"

She can _feel_ her lips flatten. What is wrong with her today? "I'm fine," she snaps, and leaves him there alone.

* * *

_So yeah, it's short. I decided to put it out of its misery. Please R&R!_

_On an unrelated note, the next chapter of Only Witness is in the works. I swear._

* * *


	14. Zebras

Disclaimer: See previous.

Because the finale ended way too fast... picking up immediately.

* * *

"_What a way to end."_

* * *

"Yeah," Olivia agrees numbly. "Call Cragen, why don't you. And Warner."

He cuffs Stuckey first, behind his back, in case he comes around quickly, and maneuvers him near a drawer. "Liv –"

Wordlessly she tosses him her handcuffs. He cuffs Stuckey to the drawer handle and tries to remember what happened to his cell phone.

"You're sure you're okay?"

"Fine. Look." He turns toward her, indicates the red slashes on his shirt. "Barely bleeding."

"How about your head?"

"Notoriously hard." He spots his phone at the far end of the lab table and goes around so that he won't have to step over a body. Step by step, he's thinking; the hard part is over, thanks to Liv, and now they just have to follow the steps.

After placing the calls to the ME's office and his own captain, terse calls, _we'll make our statements when you get here,_ he hears a small sound, not unlike a sob. He turns around and Olivia is kneeling beside O'Halloran, one hand over her mouth, as though she's ashamed of making such a noise. He has to walk all the way around the table again to kneel next to her, place a gentle hand on her shoulder. "Liv," he says, but words aren't big enough for this loss. In this calm before the storm, the only words big enough for tonight are, "Thank you."

* * *

In short order chaos descends on the lab in the form of numerous crime scene techs, CSU's captain, the director of the labs, a few uniforms, and Don Cragen. Evidence is bagged: knife, gun, duct tape. Their captain is heard to mutter, before he even asks them what happened, "The paperwork on this is going to be incredible."

Olivia meets Warner at the door. "If you don't want to do this, just say the word," she says; she isn't sure how often Warner and O'Halloran crossed paths.

Melinda is calm, pale. "Out of my way," she says. "This one's _mine._"

* * *

By the time they've told the story once, they're exhausted. But the questions keep coming, from all sides, detectives, officers, techs, everyone wants a personal piece of the story.

The moment Olivia spots her partner trip over nothing, she's next to him, pressing him down onto a stool. "Melinda," she calls, "can you tell me if we should be worried about him?"

"I'm _fine,_" Elliot says irritably; everyone who sees his shirt has been asking him if he's all right and he just wants to go home.

"We'll let the woman who went to medical school be the judge of that," Olivia says, irrelevantly because Warner is already peering into Elliot's eyes.

"Mild concussion, I think," she says when she straightens. "It's probably not too serious, but I'd feel better if you got it looked at." She glances down at his chest. "Might want to get some antibiotics too."

"That's it." Olivia folds her arms sternly. "We're going to the hospital. Now."

"Liv – "

"C'mon. It's close. I'll drive." Just close enough for him to hear she mutters, "It's not here."

Suddenly the prospect of _not here_ is the most wonderful thing he can imagine. Dutifully Elliot follows his partner's lead.

* * *

"You're okay," she says to him, much later. The words curl at the corners, questioning.

"I'm okay," he echoes. "Thanks to you."

"Well."

"Liv."

"Yeah?"

"You were brilliant."

* * *

The morning dawns like any other. Then she gets to work and Munch presents her with an extra-large jug of mouthwash, wearing an extra-wide smile to match.

"Well, I'm glad someone's having fun," she says, then smiles back just because he's trying so hard.

"You know you want it."

"The nurses gave me a lifetime supply in those little travel bottles once I told them why I needed it." What she really needs now is a truckload of hand sanitizer. Last night she showered until she couldn't tell whether her palms were burning from the hot water, or from Stuckey's skin, or from the force of her own blows.

Elliot comes in then, spots the mouthwash, and grins. "I thought of that. Good thing I didn't get it, huh?"

"Shut up."

"Be nice. I'm under strict orders to bring you home for dinner tonight. It'll be more fun if we're nice."

"Bring her home?" Munch queries. "You make it sound like she's a stray."

"You're a great help, John."

"You're welcome."

Elliot shakes his head and looks straight at her, the way he did last night, trying to say a dozen things at once. "What do you say, Liv? We're grilling. Big fat burgers and whatever salad Dick comes up with. That part may or may not be edible."

"Whatever _Dick_ comes up with?" she repeats.

"He's going through a cooking phase. Teenage boy. Food. What can I say?" He settles into his desk and suddenly smiles. "You know who will be really excited to see you?"

"Who?"

"Eli."

She grins in spite of herself. Who is she trying to fool, anyway? She knows she'll go for dinner, if only because she doesn't want to let her partner out of her sight any more than she has to.

Fin arrives then. "Turn on the news," he says, and Munch obeys. Predictably, the media have somehow got hold of the story: NYPD Scientist Murdered, reads the headline across the bottom of the screen. The newscaster knows far too much of the story. The name Stuckey rolls off his tongue as though it is already a catchphrase, already Spitzer, Blagojevich, Varney. The name O'Halloran is barely mentioned. So it goes.

Cragen brings the morning paper and she promptly clips the front page, O'Halloran's picture with the terrible headline. She tapes it to her desk blotter. This is what she's going to remember: that sides can change. To watch everyone. To never, ever assume.

* * *

Elliot and Olivia spend the morning buried in paperwork while the daily work of the unit goes on around them. Finally Cragen steps out of his office and looks at them. "Take a break, you two. Get some lunch."

"Don't have to tell me twice," Elliot sighs. Olivia taps her pen against her lower lip, shifts a stack of papers to look down at O'Halloran's face. She needs a break. She can't stop working.

"Liv," the captain says, but she doesn't look up.

"She's okay," she hears Elliot say, confident. "She kicked ass last night. It takes time to fully recover from that kind of brilliance."

"Ah. So that's why you have a smart mouth today? You're recovering?"

"Exactly. Hey Liv, think fast."

She catches it reflexively before recognizing it: a desk dispenser of Purell.

Elliot nods to the jug of Listerine still sitting on her desk. "Mouthwash was too obvious. Someone else was bound to come up with that."

"Not funny," she says, when really she's trying not to cry because somehow he knew exactly what she needed.

"C'mon," he says, "let's get out of here."

* * *

"So," he says on the way to his house, at a reasonable hour due to their alleged need to recover. "To warn you."

Olivia raises an eyebrow. "I have to be warned?"

"Yes. Kathy will hug you."

Finally the obvious occurs to her. "El…you _talked_ to your wife. Didn't you?"

He glances her way, worried. "Should I not have?"

"You're an idiot," she manages, but by the end she's laughing so hard she can't breathe.

Elliot watches her cautiously. "So…"

At length she recovers enough to answer his unspoken question. "Good job."

"Really?"

"Keep that up, and you'll have an actual relationship again."

"I have a relationship," he says, trying to sound insulted.

"Yeah, and six months ago she was ready to walk out."

"Low blow."

"Sorry," she says unrepentantly. "You were warning me?"

"Yes. My wife, with whom I have a much better relationship, thank you, will hug you. The kids don't know what happened, but if Liz sees her mother hug you she'll get curious and ask all sorts of inappropriate questions. And then Dick, who is otherwise unobservant, will get curious. So get ready."

"I think I can handle your kids," she says comfortably, settling back into her seat. She can't remember the last time she was so excited about an evening.

"I think so too," he says. "You handled Stuckey, after all."

She groans. "You've really got to stop that, you know."

"Why?"

Because he spent all afternoon telling anyone who would listen that she'd pulled off the best bluff he'd ever seen. "It's embarrassing," she tries.

"So? I'm the one bragging here. See, I'm one of those crazy people who thinks everyone should know when something that amazing goes down."

"You're doing it again."

Elliot laughs and turns onto a quiet street. She's surprised to realize that they're almost there.

"El," she says when they pull into his driveway. Caught by her tone, he shuts off the ignition and just looks at her piercingly. As though he could divine all her thoughts but chooses not to, chooses only to look at what she needs him to know.

This is what saved his life last night.

"Thanks," she whispers. He searches her face, reading the list of things she's talking about: having her for dinner. Bragging for her. Giving her hand sanitizer. Not dying. In the face of all that, nothing she's ever hated him for is that important.

He knows this too, has known it all along: that while there are times she'd really love to smack him, she didn't mean any of it last night. He can read that, always. The unconscious does not lie.

Her partner offers her a quirk of a smile. "Hey," he says quietly. "Let's go."

* * *

_-finis-_

* * *

...And there you have it. The end of season ten.

However, season eleven is just around the corner. You can tell by the convenient habit these seasons have of coinciding with the school year, and thus by the truckload of mail I'm getting from college (eek!). I hope to do this again next year. I'll need a new song title...and of course proper encouragement. ::wink::

I simply had to leave Only Witness for a while to work on this. The next chapter will be coming soon though. This time I mean it.

Have a great summer, everyone, and pleeeeease review!

* * *


End file.
